The seven prior volumes of this series of astrological interpretations have been received with such an enthusiastic welcome by so many astrology students everywhere that we are pleased to add No. 8 to the series.

   Elman Bacher's profound knowledge of and devotion to the spiritual aspect of the stellar science, along with an uncanny understanding of human nature, made it possible for him to present illuminating astrological treatises which undoubtedly place him among the best of modern esoteric astrologers. As the truth and value of his spiritual interpretation of astrology become more and more generally accepted, his presentations will serve increasingly to help people know themselves and fulfill their highest destiny.

   Before passing into the higher realms in the early 1950s, Mr. Bather expressed a keen desire to have us publish his articles in book form, and although we deeply regret that he did not live to see his articles made available to the public in this convenient form, we are happy in knowing that his wish is being fulfilled.

   To the Rosicrucian student astrology is a phase of religion, basically a spiritual science. More than any other study it reveals man to himself. No other science is so sublime, so profound, and so all- embracing. It portrays the relation between God, the macrocosm, and man, the microcosm, showing them to be fundamentally one.

   Esoteric science, investigating the subtler forces that impinge upon man, the Spirit, and his vehicles, has charted their effects with no less definiteness than has academic science the reactions of sea and soil, plant and animal to the solar and lunar rays.

   With this knowledge we may determine the astrological pattern of each individual and know the relative strength and weakness of the various forces operating in each life. To the degree that we are in possession of such knowledge we can begin systematic, scientific character building — and character is destiny! We note times and seasons cosmically advantageous to unfolding undeveloped qualities, correcting faulty traits, and eliminating destructive propensities.

   The divine science of astrology reveals the hidden causes at work in our lives. It counsels the adult in regard to vocation, the parent in the guidance of children, the teacher in management of pupils, the physician in diagnosing disease, thus lending aid to each and all in whatever position they may find themselves.

   No other subject within the range of human knowledge appears to hold for this day and age the possibilities open to astrologers for helping people to their own dignity as gods-in-the-making, to a greater grasp of universal law, and to a realization that we are eternally secure within the caressing fold of Infinite Life and Boundless Being.

   This discourse on wedding charts is offered as an attempt to clarify to astrological students the processes and meanings of the togetherness of two persons who are united for mutual experience in marriage. It has been felt by the author for some time that to do a chart for the time that the wedding is scheduled to start is not really valid. Herein is presented a little food for thought as to the valid timing of a wedding chart.

   From what esoteric philosophy has to say about human evolution through the processes of re-incarnation, to "be born" really means to "re-appear in the flesh." Since we have all been involved in the re- incarnative process for quite some time now, "to be married" really means "to be married again." It is extremely unlikely that any person now incarnate has never before been committed to the marital estate. We have all done the equivalent of saying "I do" in various languages, countries, and epochs — and in voices either loud or soft. Since "husband-wife" is a specialized identity of "man-woman," the twofold "I do" and the final pronouncements of the officiant (or their equivalents) is really a variation of "I Am;" in other words, as far as this incarnation is concerned, the birth of a new identity. There is a remarkable parallel between the "birth of husband-wife" and that of the individual as a physical expression. Let us consult the Great Mandala:

   A circle with the vertical and horizontal diameters; the symbols of the cardinal signs (Aries, Capricorn, Libra, Cancer) at the left point, upper point, right point, and lower point, respectively (the cusps of the Ascendant, tenth, seventh, and fourth houses); from the midpoint of the Cancer-line through the midpoints of Libra-Capricorn and down to the midpoint of Aries, draw a curved line, resulting in three-quarters of a circle; connect, by drawing a straight line, the cusp-points of Aries-Cancer (the points where the cusp-lines strike the circle.)

   To digress for just a moment to explain the symbolism of the straight Aries-Cancer line: until you arrive at the half-way point when you walk or drive through a tunnel you are entering the interior of the mountain or hill; the half-way point marks the change of your relationship with the interior and as you continue on from the interior toward the exit; as you pass through the exit you leave the interior. On the inner planes, between incarnated states, there is a "turning point" which is determined by your fitness to reincarnate. The vibratory gravitational pull of your unfulfilled ideals then goes into effect and your preparations for reincarnation begin to be activated. In other words, from that point you are leaving the interior of subjectivity — the "exit" of which is your first contact with your vehicle-to-be at conception.

   While you are still in the subjective state but are preparing for reincarnation, things are happening on the objective plane. For example: those who are to be your parents may have recently met each other, recognized the mutual love-attraction and desire for union, prepared for their wedding-ceremony, established their home, effected the intimacy of their union, etc. Or, if another child or other children preceded you into the family, this outer preparation may simply be the mutual decision of your parents-to-be to fulfill their urge for further parental experience and, in response to that urge, they effect the emotional and physical synchronization which results in the conception of your vehicle. Whatever it may be, preparation is synchronized in both the inner and outer states. At the timing that is exactly right for your requirements, the seed of your body is ignited into expression and your vehicle commences its individualization. At the end of the prenatal period you are "born" — which simply means "physically individualized." Your body is, at one and the same time, the chemicalized expression of a desire-object upon which your parents are to exercise their individual and mutual Love-Wisdom resources and your desire to evolve through new expressions of your potentials.

   The quadrant in the mandala represented by "Aries-to-Cancer" is the subjective preparation of your incarnation; Cancer is conception; Libra is the objectification of physical sex-to-be and subjectification of complementation-to-be; Capricorn is the solidification of the organism; Pisces, if it were to be shown at the twelfth cusp, is the condensed symbol of the unfulfilled residues of the three crosses; Aries, at the end of the three crosses; Aries at the end of the three pre-natal quadrants, is the symbol of your re-appearance, at birth, in physical individuality — the re-objectification of your "I Am" on this plane. From then on, until transition back to subjectivity, your "I Am" unfolds its potentials through your various relationship-exchanges with other human beings. Give this much thought and reflection — it is the "human picturing" of a cosmic pattern.

   With this analogy in mind and keeping the mandala at hand, we will now translate this pattern into terms of the subject at hand — the significance of the wedding ceremony as the establishment of a new identity of two human beings.

   The "subjective turning-point" is the time when each person acts on a thought, a feeling, or an opportunity in such a way that their meeting is the inevitable outcome. Examples: they each accept an invitation (1) to dinner at the home of a mutual friend tomorrow evening; (2) to enjoy a camping trip with mutual friends next month; (3) to attend an exhibition of Chinese art on a certain day next January, or if they are both astrologers — bless their hearts; (4) to speak at a convention of "Star-lit Stargazers, Inc." at West Blubber, Greenland, in 1968. The receipt of the invitation marks the turning-point; the acceptance is the action which draws them, day by day, from the "subjectivity of bachelorhood-spinsterhood" toward the "objectivity of new identity as husband-wife." The time element is, of course, an individual variable, some couples must wait a long time before they meet while others meet and enjoy attraction to each other in sudden and (most delightfully) unexpected ways. The "mutual friends" — or the Board of Directors of "Star-lit Stargazers, Inc." — are chemicalized agencies of the one magnetic Love-power that is instrumental in effecting the contact of the two persons with each other.

   The first meeting of the two persons ends the "subjective" phase and this "point in time" is analogous to the "conception-point" of the mandate. Now their togetherness is physically established and the vibratory exchange is, consciously or unconsciously, inaugurated.

   From Cancer to Libra in the mandala is the time-element between the meeting of the two persons and their love-recognition of each other. When that takes place (the "maturing of the polarity-awareness of adolescence"), the subjectivity of gender, which coincided with the objectivity of sex in the actual pre-natal period, is mutually ignited by the action of sympathetic vibration; each sees the other as the ideal chemicalized symbol of the subjectified generic qualities — or "complementation" on all planes. They do not "fall" (awful word!) in love; they lift each other in consciousness by the mutual fusion of the best of their qualities. This "mutual fusion of vibration" is the archetype of that which is chemically expressed in the action we call sexual intercourse. Both of these "fusions" are releasements of tremendous resources and they are attended by "more-intense-than-ever-before" realizations of ideal, emotional, mental, and spiritual being-ness. The vibratory fusion organizes the conscious recognition, by each of "need for each other." In mutuality, this eventually leads — according to personal inclination — to the decision to marry; also, according to personal inclination, this is followed by announcement of the intention. The decision and the announcement are symbolized in the mandala by Capricorn at the uppermost point of the wheel — the symbol of concreteness, organization, and condensation — polarity of Cancer.

   The emotional state objectified by the announcement establishes the identity of "betrothed" and it should be added that, in this "prenatal" explanation, the sign Leo and the fifth house — following Cancer — would symbolize the individualized love of each of the persons for the other. Leo is love-radiation — an individualized matter; it is not love-exchange, and all of the "identity-points" of the cardinal mandala are such because they refer to "relationships-by-complementation;" a "mother" is such in relationship to "child" and a "brother" is such in relationship to another brother or to a sister; the Capricorn of this symbol is the objectified identity of individual and mutual, Leo-Libra, "loving and being loved"-ness. In our tradition a ring is given by the man to the woman as a "dramatization" of his uplifted awareness of ideality, the power of which is symbolized by the brilliant beauty of the jewel — usually a diamond, which is the jewel-symbol of the Sun. This ring and the one — sometimes two — used in the wedding ceremony is never, as some have thought, a symbol of woman's bondage to, or enslavement by, man; it is always, because it is a circle, the symbol of the perfect-fulfillment of perfect exchange in perfect union. Mutual decision, presentation, and acceptance of the ring, the formal announcement and the first plan for time and place of the wedding ceremony are summed up in the Capricorn-point. The Aquarius of this fourth quadrant from Aries would symbolize the radiation of invitations to persons who love, and are loved and appreciated by, the betrothed couple; the love-extension to family-members and friends; the parents may feel that they are "losing their children" but actually they are, by the fraternity of Aquarius, gaining a "younger brother and sister." The young couple, at marriage, become members of the fraternity of husbands and wives, and, subsequently, that of fathers and mothers — of which their own parents are "senior members."

   The last phase of this "pre-natal" period of the marriage would be the sign Pisces in its regenerate meaning — symbol of faith and ideality. To marry is to signify an affirmation of one's realization of life's good and beauty and also to signify a willingness to contribute to Life of one's resources of Good and Beauty. The Pisces of the mandala symbolizes the wedding-ceremony as a dramatized symbol of the deepest and most heartfelt realizations of human joy, inspiration, and loveliness. The artistry of gowns and formal dress, flowers, and music symbolize Humanity's urge to reach and express realizations of eternal beauty — perfected manifestation. In our tradition, the ceremony usually starts with the first note of the musical prelude or of the wedding-march itself. The ceremony progresses, as we "travel through" Pisces, in points of prayer, meditation, music, and recitation of spiritual thoughts concerning the inner meaning of marriage. The officiant symbolizes in his person the intermediary between the personality and the reality of each of the two people. When he says "I now pronounce you husband and wife," the movement through Pisces — as the symbolic ceremony — is terminated at Aries and the emergence into Aries symbolizes the new identity of the couple as "husband and wife" in relationship to each other and in relationship, as individuals, to their individual life-pattern. Great bursts of music — and this music should be radiant and ecstatic in quality — and the couple walk together for the first time in their new identity. And — God bless them all — always.

   Something is often done in wedding ceremonies that is really not in keeping with the symbolism of the ceremony; that is for the officiant to pronounce the couple — at the conclusion of the service — "man and wife." A "man" is an adult, male human being; as such, before he can even consider marriage he must, of necessity, function for a few days, weeks, months, or years as "an adult male human being." The identity that is newly established is "husband," and with the assumption of that identity the man "incarnates" into a new octave of his "I AM" awareness as a symbol of his capacity and willingness to unfold and to express new levels of consciousness, resources, and powers.

   With the saying of the word "wife" in the above pronouncement, the statement of new identity is complete and integrated; the "pre-natal period" is finished and the material relationship is incarnated. It is the sincere and long-thought-of conviction of the author that the time of the officiants saying "wife" is the time that should be used for the wedding-chart. Regardless of plans, schedules, and announcements, the marriage is not "fully-born" until that pronouncement is complete. The child's birth-cry and the pronouncement of the wedding-officiant are both expressions of the power of the word — the living vibratory stamp of a new identity; from then on, the new-born child and the new-born husband-wife team are individualized "things-in-themselves;" they are, as it were, "on their own."

   If you have the charts of the bride and groom, identify their planetary rulers with the wedding-chart to determine which factor in the chart is "personalized" by each. A wedding-chart is not a "composite of two people;" it is the astrological pattern of a specialized experience. Follow this out by correlating, as much as possible, each planetary pattern of the individuals with the wedding chart for study of vibratory groupings. Then apply to each person's chart the planetary ruler and positions of the wedding chart; this is to study the essential meanings — to each individual — of the experience as a most important factor in the sequence of life-experiences. Having either or both of the individual charts complete would, of course, impose the requirement of studying the progressed aspects — particularly those of the Moon — to study the individualized chart-action. If you do not have the birth time you will not have the complete charts but you can still group the planetary positions by crosses (cardinal, fixed, mutable) and generic (Fire, Earth, Air, Water) trines and compare them with the planet-groupings of the wedding chart. In either case, since any event occurs between two junctions, apply the previous solar eclipse to the individual's charts (not to the wedding chart because the wedding was not yet "born" when the eclipse fell) and list the aspects that it, and its resultant Full Moon made. If the wedding occurred after an eclipse-month then note also the effects of the lunation preceding the wedding on the individual's charts. Note the effects — on all three charts — of the solar eclipse which first falls after the wedding; pay particular attention to the "point," if there is such, that this eclipse stimulates in all three charts and note the extent of time between it and the next eclipse. This eclipse-pattern stimulating all three charts opens up the first major testing of the people by marriage and of the marriage itself from a certain composite of weaknesses of the two people, as individuals and as a couple. Also, for basic reading, list all "points-in-common" in the three charts; all such planets in the persons' charts that are squared or opposed tell you that — because of synchronization with a planet in the wedding chart — the marital experience brings to the persons an "apex opportunity" to perceive congestions in consciousness; conversely, all such planets that are sextiled will urge the exercise of self-directed transmutation; all that are trined will represent the "marriage's ability" to "bless the people" and through which they will experience hyper-realizations of their ideality. In other words, all of those patterns are experiences that are especially focalized in the marriage. The "uniqueness" of the wedding chart focalizes the individual and mutual uniqueness of the persons.

   When you study a wedding chart, pay much more attention to diameters than to separate house-cusps. Marriage is objectified human polarity and the diameters picture the foundations of the "two-in-one-ness" of all human experiences; in other words, the polarity foundations. Finance-stewardship is second-house — eighth-house; children are fifth-house — eleventh-house, etc. The seventh house of a wedding chart, in its squares and oppositions, sums up the vibratory power that challenges the integrity of the union.

   All this is an excellent exercise of your synthesizing ability as an interpreter, an important phase of your service and a delightful stimulus to everything in your nature that makes you love astrology.

   One more suggestion; try reading your own natal horoscope as a "Marriage chart;" philosophically speaking — you figure this out — that's exactly what it is!